Iraqi News Highlights Monday Afternoon 3-6-23
Tlm724 Administrator Bondlady’s Corner
An Economist For / Nina /: All The Measures Of The Central Bank Did Not Succeed In Controlling The Rise In The Price Of The Dollar
Monday 06 March 2023 09:04 | Economical Number of readings: 538 Baghdad / NINA / – The specialist in economic affairs, Dergham Muhammad Ali, confirmed: “All the measures of the Central Bank and economic security did not contribute to controlling the rhythm of the commodity and dollar market.”
Muhammad Ali said in a statement to the National Iraqi News Agency ( NINA ) that “the intermediate link, represented by the banks, is the cause of the problem. None of the treatments succeeded in achieving price stability, and the only beneficiaries are the bank brokers.”
He pointed out, “Linking dollar sales to travel outside Iraq is a kind of legal smuggling of foreign currency, and the local market does not benefit from it, and most of the goods and products are still at high prices without real solutions.”
The economic specialist stressed, “The economic security must monitor the selling prices of imported goods to the beneficiaries of remittances at the official price, especially basic commodities.”
The Central Bank of Iraq had issued several packages of economic measures to control the exchange rate of the dollar against the dinar in the Iraqi market. The dollar is still high, and today it reached 158 thousand dinars for every 100 dollars. https://ninanews.com/Website/News/Details?Key=1038591
Al-Sudani Meets With The Director-General Of UNESCO And Appreciates Her Efforts And Initiatives In Iraq
Monday 06 March 2023 17:42 | political Number of readings: 128 Baghdad / NINA / – Prime Minister Muhammad Shia’a Al-Sudani met today, Monday, with the Director-General of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), Audrey Azoulay, and her accompanying delegation.
Al-Sudani appreciated the organization’s efforts and initiatives in Iraq, in addition to what was discussed with it during his recent visit to Paris.
The Prime Minister expressed Iraq’s aspiration to enhance the international organization’s support for its efforts in the field of recovering stolen Iraqi antiquities, stressing his high evaluation of the organization’s efforts to include many Iraqi tangible and natural heritage files in the World Heritage List.
He stressed Iraq’s quest for more cooperation with UNESCO in various files, including; The file of the displaced and their camps, assistance in rehabilitating them and providing them with educational opportunities, maintenance of archaeological sites that were vandalized by ISIS gangs, building human capacities, developing school curricula, and many other files of cooperation.
For her part, Azulari affirmed the international organization’s openness to all forms of cultural, scientific and heritage cooperation with Iraq, noting the desire to provide support in the matter of updating curricula and making them parallel to international standards.
She described cooperation with Iraq as continuous, and that her visit comes in order to set priorities and develop plans to develop joint action.
She indicated the organization’s readiness to send a specialized team to support Iraq in the field of water management within the international hydrological program concerned with water affairs./End 7
A Slight Decrease In World Oil Prices
Monday 06 March 2023 09:47 | Economical Number of readings: 312 Baghdad / NINA / – International oil prices fell at the beginning of trading today, Monday, after China set a modest target for economic growth this year of about 5%.
Today, Monday, Brent crude futures contracts recorded $85.33 a barrel, while West Texas Intermediate crude futures recorded a decrease of $79.22 a barrel./ End 9
https://ninanews.com/Website/News/Details?key=1038640
The Central Bank Provides Facilities To Traders That Prevent Smuggling Of Dollars To Countries Facing Sanctions
Posted On2023-03-06 By Sotaliraq Baghdad / Firas Adnan The Parliamentary Finance Committee talked about great facilities that the Central Bank began to provide to Iraqi merchants wishing to import, stressing that these measures ensure the safety of transferring the dollar outside Iraq and not going to unofficial destinations, noting that the stability of the exchange rate in the parallel market still needs some time.
Committee member Mueen Al-Kazemi said, “The Central Bank of Iraq is working in cooperation with the government to facilitate the currency window and enable the issuance of bank transfers to merchants smoothly and quickly.”
Al-Kazemi added, “The aim of this is to make it easy to pass the bank transfer transaction to merchants, whether large or small, and thus not resorting to money changers and private banks to obtain dollars.”
He pointed out, “These measures would maintain the exchange rate of the dollar, and ensure that it does not rise in the parallel market.”
Al-Kadhimi stressed that “there are facilities in the field of accepting merchants according to the identity of the Chamber of Commerce and a statement of the materials that each merchant wants to import, the importer from and all the data for the issuance of the transfer, which leads to the application of the electronic platform system known as (SWIFT).”
And he continues, “The Central Bank is working to continue this trend, and it is required that there be a performance of banks that buy currency and are charged with providing what merchants need to adhere to the controls.”
Al-Kazemi noted, “The government confirms that the measures taken, which need a short period of time, will show their effects in reducing the price of the dollar in the parallel market.”
And he continues, “The central bank adopts a price of 1,300 dinars per dollar, and on this basis there will be seriousness in providing it at this price.”
Al-Kadhimi spoke of a “gradual decline that will occur in the parallel market, which was stated by the Prime Minister, Muhammad Shia’a Al-Sudani.”
And he reported, “Al-Sudani advised the acquisition of the Iraqi dinar, which was supported by the government in the face of the price of the dollar, although this measure reduced state revenues from 149 trillion dinars to 135 trillion dinars.”
Al-Kazemi stressed that “the parallel market benefits speculators, and they are currently making large sums of money, taking advantage of the margin of difference with the price at which the central bank sells, and this requires that the government impose its control in order to implement steps to address the dollar crisis and prevent speculation.”
And he called, to “impose an application on private banks that buy from the currency auction, because they are responsible for providing dollars to merchants and groups identified by the Central Bank.”
And Al-Kadhimi went on, that “the price that was decided by the Council of Ministers earlier will be approved in the budget law for the current year, which witnessed complete changes to its investment and operational aspects.”
For his part, economic academic Safwan Qusai said, “The measures of the Central Bank of Iraq, in cooperation with the US Federal Bank, contributed to the dollar not reaching goods that were imported from unofficial places.”
Qusai continued, “Those merchants who used to obtain dollars through this mechanism moved after the door was closed in their face to the parallel market, and there is a growing demand with the passage of time.”
He pointed out, “This comes in conjunction with the collapse of the Iranian currency and the decline of the Turkish currency,” pointing out that “there is a system for obtaining dollars outside the window of selling the official currency from the Central Bank, which is trying to expand legitimate transactions.”
Qusay confirmed, “The expansion of the price between the one declared at the Central Bank and what is in the parallel market indicates the presence of irregular traders who continue to export goods to Iraq without external transfer.”
And he called for “controlling border crossings and preventing the entry of goods that are purchased informally, to ensure the stability of exchange rates.”
And Qusai stated, “Iraqi banks have begun to fear entering into financial transfers to countries that are subject to sanctions for fear of being included in the penalties, because the (Swift) system began tracking the movement of funds for more than 13 transfers, and it is not possible to risk behind a forged invoice or a supplier that transfers money to these countries.” .
And he believes, “The control over private banks has begun to grow, but the problem we have is with banking companies, especially at the level of their relations with tourism companies, and they need to tighten control.”
Qusai suggested that “these exchange offices sell the currencies of the countries to which tourists go, not the dollar,” noting that “this will prevent the dollar from leaving the hands of the tourism company or the traveler until it is sold to speculators or appears in a penalized country because that weakens the US Federal Bank’s confidence in the procedures.” Iraqi.
And Qusai concluded, “The Iraqi economy should not be placed in a gray area, with the presence of continuous tracking of the movement of funds, and this requires not introducing our economy into the area ofsuspicion, especially as there are fears of transferring funds to penalized countries.”
The parallel market is still witnessing instability in the exchange rate of the dollar, despite government promises that spoke of the imminent end of the dollar crisis, which began with the imposition of measures by the American side on the conversion process and the currency auction. LINK
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